Operations

The Senate passed a bill Wednesday that would criminalize making fraudulent claims about receiving military metals.

Rep. Joe Heck (R-Nev.) introduced the Stolen Valor Act, which passed in the House on a 390-3 vote earlier this week. Heck served in the military prior to running for office.

The Topline: The Obama administration acknowledged on Wednesday that it has killed four Americans in drone strikes overseas.

Attorney General Eric Holder disclosed the killings in a letter to Congress.

The admission comes the day before President Obama is set to deliver a speech at National Defense University where he will lay out the administration’s legal justification for using drones and the future of the broader war on terror.

The president will also renew his push for the closing of the Guantánamo Bay detention facility, which had stalled during his first term.

The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that Obama plans to restart the release of detainees at Guantánamo by lifting the administration’s position on sending detainees to Yemen in the coming weeks.

There has been increased pressure in Congress among opponents of the prison to do more to release detainees amid a hunger strike that has swelled to more than 100.

In the administration’s letter acknowledging drone strikes, Holder wrote that the U.S. had targeted Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born Muslim cleric. It has been widely reported that al-Awlaki was killed in a 2011 drone attack in Yemen.

The letter then states that the U.S. is aware of “three other U.S. citizens who have been killed in such counterterrorism operations over that same time period.”

Those other three Americans are identified as al-Awlaki’s son, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, and Samir Khan and Jude Kenan Mohammad.

Holder writes that those three people were not specifically targeted by the U.S.

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Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on Wednesday directed the Pentagon to purchase a new healthcare records system that can be integrated with the system used by the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Hagel said that Pentagon would solicit bids for a new system to help resolve the problems facing the Defense Department and VA as they try to integrate their health records electronically.

“This is a complex and expensive undertaking. It is critical that we get it right,” Hagel said after he and VA Secretary Eric Shinseki met with the Senate Appropriations Committee members on Wednesday.

A staffer declined to comment as to how soon that U.S. special operations team could come before the oversight subcommittee.

The president could announce the major policy shift as soon as Thursday, according to reports.

Russia has sent Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces advanced anti-ship cruise missiles, the New York Times reported, in the latest sign Moscow will continue to help Assad’s regime militarily.

Russia had previously provided the anti-ship cruise missiles, Yakhonts, to the Syrians, but the latest shipment includes advanced radar technology, according to the Times, which cited unnamed American officials.

“It’s a real ship killer,” Nick Brown, editor in chief of IHS Jane’s International Defense Review, told the Times.

A massive car bomb ripped through an American convoy traveling through downtown Kabul on Thursday, killing 16 people including six American military advisers. 

Hezb-i-Islami, a militant faction of the Afghan insurgency allied with the Taliban, claimed responsibility for the bombing, according to The New York Times. 

Lack of control by Kabul over Afghan special forces and a misunderstanding of the political nuances surrounding Wardak province led to the ouster of American special operations troops from the restive area in central Afghanistan. 

Four American soldiers were killed in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday as U.S. and coalition forces dig in for the final fighting season of the over decade-long war. 

Three NATO troops were killed on Monday when Taliban insurgents set off a truck bomb at an alliance outpost in Southern Afghanistan. 

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